


The Alpha Bet

by TheMostePotente



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Explicit Language, F/M, M/M, Mild Gore, Pack Dynamics, Scent Marking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-20
Updated: 2012-11-20
Packaged: 2017-11-19 03:38:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/568659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheMostePotente/pseuds/TheMostePotente
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek pushes, Stiles pushes back - or is it the other way around?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Alpha Bet

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Venivincere](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Venivincere/gifts).



> For my darling Veni with love ♥
> 
> Huge thanks to J for the beta.

** The Alpha Bet **

Annabel Lee pings and pops as the exhaust system cools.

Once, Stiles pressed a stethoscope to her hood and listened. He found the mechanical heartbeats oddly calming. Like now.

The silence is punctuated with the sound of snapping jaws. An ‘oh, fuck’ follows the slide-dump of tomatoes and lettuce. In his lap. On the floor.

Annabel is his baby, goddamn him.

“Christ, Scott,” he says, reaching for Anna’s backseat. He drags up a towel still pitted with grains of sand. Tosses it at Scott’s face in mild irritation. “Shit, lay down a towel if you’re going to make a mess.”

Anna’s been a motel, a library, a coffee shop, and now, apparently a dining cart.

Anything worth keeping is worth naming, he hears his father say, reminds himself.

Scott McCall is his best friend, his brother in all things. Except this.

“Did you know if you rub taco sauce on your asshole, you’ll get a boner? Derek says it’s what porn stars do when they have to film all day.” Scott smiles as he uses three packets to drown his sixth taco.

Stiles considers a burrito, performing mild surgery on it to make sure it’s free of onions. “It’s tabasco, actually. Most some taco sauce will do is clean up a bad penny.” And speaking of bad pennies. “The sour one is a wealth of useless knowledge I see.”

Scott mmmhmms around a mouthful of taco. He wipes his mouth on the sleeve of his lacrosse jersey. “You should hear what he says about hot dogs.”

“Lemme guess,” Stiles says. “Lips and assholes?”

Scott grins. “Something like that.” There’s a piece of lettuce caught between Scott’s teeth, Stiles notes, and he opts to say nothing about it. Scott could use a fault.

Stiles has a sip of watered-down Dew, blanching at the taste. “I’ll be sure and grill hotdogs for the harvest barbecue,” he says. He reclines his seat back as far as it will go, and through the window, Stiles can just make out the moon through the trees. A crescent of silver in a sky pinpricked with stars. It’s going to be a clear Saturday.

“Derek’s not going to show for a game much less a team barbecue,” Scott says, eyeing a copse of trees. He sniffs the air and nods.

“Why not?” Stiles asks. “It’s at the full moon. You could use the support.”

The jeep door opens with a discerning creak, still misaligned from Anna’s last accident. “I don’t need a babysitter, Stiles.”

“You need a mentor, Scott, even if Hale’s a major douche.”

“Fine,” Scott agrees with a laugh, shutting the jeep door. “If you can get him to come by _your_ invitation, I’ll not only welcome his expertise, I’ll embrace it.”

Stiles holds out a hand. “The usual wager?”

Scott’s a bit fidgety, but there’s a reason he drank a thirty-two ounce Pepsi. “Since we were nine. Pinky swears and shit. But get ready to lose. Derek’s the stay at home and brood sort.”

“We’ll see about that. Now go,” Stiles says, pushing Scott out the door. “And do whatever it is you do before you piss on my seat.”

Scott jumps out and runs for the trees at breakneck speeds. No doubt to mark his turf.

A howl ricochets off every tree in the copse. Stiles turns the key in the ignition and finds the nearest station on the radio, maxxing the volume.

He drowns the moonsong just as much as he does the ache.

* * *

About forty miles north of Beacon County is a shithole bar called Sullivan’s. The tap’s a cocktail of rust and piss-water, the cable’s generally out, and the owner’s a confederate flag flying motherfucker. 

There’s also a triskelion carved into the bar top.

Derek sits on his usual stool, an empty glass in front of him and a cigarette wedged between two fingers. He could lose a few hours with the girl a few stools over. A few more with the two college boys playing quarters behind him.

That’s not going to happen, though.

“How’s it going, Hale?” The voice quavers then steadies. Derek recognizes it as Scott’s friend. The asshole with the jeep. And the Poe fetish.

Derek ignores the question, refuses to turn and look at the kid. He’s no more than a pup, the runt of the litter, begging for attention – or something else he’s not going to get.

“I’ll have a gin and tonic,” the kid says with a grin. “On his tab.”

The bartender looks between them.

Derek still doesn’t face the kid. “I’ll have another Jack and coke, and he’ll have a Shirley Temple.”

“I hate grenadine,” the kid offers.

The stool swivels, squeaking in protest. A cloud of smoke dirties the air between them. “And don’t forget the cherries, two of them. You know. Skewered on a plastic sword.”

“I hate plastic swords.”

Silence replaces the smoke until two glasses are plunked down. “Enjoy your drinks, ladies.”

The kid does something suicidal then. He reaches for Derek’s glass and downs the contents. A runt with balls bigger than eyes and ears.

A hand reaches over, covers the kid’s, longish nails digging into tender flesh. “Take your drink and go the fuck away, kid. Not in the mood.”

For better or worse, the kid remains. He swallows both of the cherries whole before plucking the cigarette from Derek’s fingers.

Rage burns deep in his gut. He’s tired of having everything taken from him. He’s up so fast the stool catches on a corner of missing tile and teeters.

The kid flinches and takes a clumsy step backwards. His arm upends a bowl of pretzels, and he mistakenly lap dances the mouth-breather one stool over.

This doesn’t bode well. 

The commotion is attention getting. “One of you shitstains better pick up those pretzels from my floor, or I’m shoving them up your asses one at a time.”

The kid falls obediently to the floor after a push from the mouth breather. Derek watches as each piece is picked up. He tries not to notice the crane of the kid’s neck or the way he crawls about on all fours in a mad scramble. Derek’s cock is absolutely not hard watching the arch of the kid’s back or the defiant lift of the kid’s shoulders.

Derek picks the kid up by the scruff of his neck and pulls him into the shitter. He shoves him up hard against an already dented stall door. Watches as the kid swallows, once, twice, three times in the waiting game.

“What the fuck are you doing here, kid?”

“Stiles,” the kid chokes out. “My name is Stiles. Scott’s friend.”

Derek lets him go, turning and crossing to a urinal. “I know who you are. What are you doing here?”

Stiles follows behind him. “Extending an invitation. To our harvest barbecue.”

His laugh is hollow, perhaps so he can bury something else inside it. “Don’t make me fucking laugh. Get in your jeep and go home, Stiles. If Scott wants my help he can ask for it himself.” Derek unzips and pisses, both eyes on the stream.

“I’m asking,” Stiles says. “Not him. Me.”

Derek turns his body and pisses across the top of Stiles’s boots. Stiles doesn’t budge. “I hate barbecues. Three guesses as to why.”

Stiles doesn’t flinch at the wetness either. “But you’ll come.” He prances right up to Derek and picks something out of his mouth, stuffing it into Derek’s jacket pocket.

Derek just watches him leave, hand still hot on his prick.

After the door closes, Derek pulls a double-knotted cherry stem from out of his pocket. A vicious grin spreads across his face.

* * *

If Scott didn’t have him over as much, Stiles reasons he’d probably starve to death. His father is too busy being the sheriff to cook, let alone grocery shop. There is little more than a stick of butter and a jar of peanut butter in the Stillinksi fridge.

The alphabet magnets that spell out the shopping list are taunting him. He just can’t survive a house arrest on an empty stomach. He easily tracks the spare set of keys, gas fumes enough to weather the distance.

Scott’s mother is working third shift at the hospital. They have the run of the place, carte blanche to do whatever they like.

They gorge on pizza and ribs and a bucket of chicken, and Scott passes the recovery time with Zantac and texting. Stiles flips through as many cable channels as he can before settling on something with swords and sorcery.

The doorbell rings and Scott jumps, but Stiles is used to (and admittedly all right with) Scott losing himself in this other world that only Allison inhabits. Stiles answers the side door and finds Derek standing there, soaked to the skin in the cold autumnal rain. He shoulders past Stiles and drips on the kitchen floor, dirt smudged and blood stained, trodden earth under jagged nails.

“Where’s McCall?” Derek asks.

The front door closes in answer.

Derek moves to follow, but Stiles blocks his path. “Let him go.”

He tosses a dishtowel at Derek. “He’ll be back soon enough. Wait it out?”

Short on words, Derek slumps into a chair, looking expectantly at Stiles. They’ve played this game once before.

Stiles disappears upstairs and returns with a change of clothes. Derek is stuck with whatever’s clean and oversized, and that may or may not include a Captain America t-shirt. He follows his laundry service up with a can of Sprite and a plate of cold pizza.

“Ate before I came,” Derek says, thumbing the plate away.

“Then you’ll eat again,” Stiles answers, pushing it back, cocksure.

The hiss of the tab being pulled back is nothing short of gratifying.

“Don’t I get a…”

A straw hits Derek in the face. Stiles settles next to Derek while he puzzles that one out. Setting a box between them, Stiles pulls out a chessboard and two sets of pieces. “Rumor has it you were a bit of a chess player.”

“She was,” Derek offers. “I was mostly along for the ride.” 

The she being, Stiles guesses, either Laura or Kate. He doesn’t ask which. “Play me. If I win, you come to the barbecue.”

“And if I win?” Derek asks.

Stiles grins. “You come to the barbecue. In costume.”

He watches as Derek just shakes his head and sets his side of the board.

This can and will go only one of two ways. Stiles wins in the least number of moves necessary for victory - four. The checkmate is as respectful a coup de grace as one can make.

Derek’s armsweep upsets the board and any remaining pieces. Some of them tumble into the adjoining room. Not a muscle twitches on Stiles’s face, though. Head bowed, he bends the knee, like one of the characters in one of his movies, as if to swear fealty to the wolf-prince.

A strong grip pulls Stiles up and back to his feet before he can reach for the piece closest him. Derek gathers the pieces instead, separating three distinct shapes. It’s obvious to Stiles what the crown symbolizes, but he puzzles in respect to what both the pawn and the knight represent for him. A duality of natures, perhaps?

“This is about more than just a barbecue. You want me to turn you, don’t you, you little shit?” Derek asks, advancing on Stiles. “For me, it’s about what kind of brother you’d make, where you’d sit in the hierarchy. If you even have what it takes in the first place.”

Stiles’s face brightens. “I know I’d be your piece de resistance.” Derek shoves both the pawn and the knight at Stiles. The horse’s head digs into his chest. It hurts more than he’s willing to admit. 

Derek looks unimpressed. “Uh huh.”

“I have that certain je ne sais quoi.”

“You can’t talk your way past everything in French, kid.”

Stiles’s reply is sure to irritate. “Au contraire.”

Derek leaves in a huff.

Stiles is left measuring each piece, weighing each choice. The decision should come easy.

Should, but doesn’t.

* * *

October thirty-first is a moon of hounds and jackals.

Derek sits cross-legged on the rotting floor boards. All that remains of the Hale name is in ruins; the house, Peter.

Laura.

His eyes follow a cold puff of breath to the splintered roof. Too much has been lost to be found again, to go back. What Derek needs are pushes forward. He thinks he can find that in pack brothers. In a lacrosse player. In his jeep-driving sidekick.

At the very least, Derek means to try. He just knows he can’t stay here. In this house. In this stage of grief. In this mindset.

He wills himself up, out of there, somewhere else, anywhere but here. 

That stupid fucking barbecue is the first place that comes to mind. Derek knows just how he’ll dress, too, taking what’s left of the stairs to the basement. He plucks a steel wolf mask from behind the wet-bar, catches a glimpse of blue and red and orange and yellow on the scorched door of the mini-fridge. Alphabet magnets that spell the simplest missive; _come_.

Derek smiles, smiles and leaves with a vengeance.

When he arrives, he finds Stiles manning the grill, the Robin to Scott’s Batman. Derek pulls Stiles aside, removes the rusty mask with the jagged edges. He presses him firm to a brick wall, sniffs the hollow of his throat, the dips of his collarbones.

Stiles lays a hand on Derek’s chest, listening for something, feeling for something. It feels oddly soothing to Derek. “Clever costume,” Stiles tells him. 

“Got an answer for me, kid?” he asks, hand outstretched.

“How about I char you a hotdog instead, Hale?”

Derek kisses the corner of Stiles’s mouth. “Lips and assholes.”

“Is there room for my mind in that gutter?” Stiles asks, placing a knight in Derek’s palm.

Anything worth keeping is worth naming. Brother. Beta. _Stiles._

Derek’s cock jumps at the suffocation of pheromones, the anticipation of the bite and the rush of the turn. Stiles presses in closer.

Scott never comes to collect.

::End::


End file.
